October | Cathy C. Hall Writes

Good, old October is one of my favoritest months for many reasons, but now I have another reason to add to the list. It’s National Book Month! Wheeeee!

Now, honestly, I don’t need bells and whistles or a monthly celebration to get me to read. I LOVE to read. I would read here or there, at the store, behind a door, on a couch, in a pouch, in a car, covered with tar. I do so love reading all kinds of books. Thank you, thank you, books with hooks.

Um, I seem to have gone off on a Dr. Seuss tangent. The point is, October is National Book Month, so perhaps you might like to check out the National Book Foundation site where you’ll find lovely lists of National Book Award winners and other ideas to cram ever more books into your life.

Right now, I’m reading a folksy, self-pubbed memoir called The Thrill of the Chase by Forrest Fenn. If you live out around Santa Fe, and have a hankering to go treasure hunting, check out Fenn’s poem (in the book) filled with enigmatic clues to the buried gold. That’s right, he buried a treasure chest and it’s there, yours for the taking, if you find it.

It’s kind of the perfect book to start National Book Month. Because for me, every book holds treasure. How about you? What are you reading in good, old October? I’ll keep you updated on my choices this month, and you can keep me updated with your choices. Oh, I am really LOVING October!

So, I’m wrapping up the October Things Giveaway with the last Birthday freebie…a bookmark!

Oh, not just any bookmark, friends. This is a special, one of a kind bookmark, made for yours truly when I attended the JapanFest in my fair city. Er, county.

It’s Japanese writing and it says…CATHY!

Um, yeah. I know. It’s just my name. Wouldn’t it have been swell if I could have had that lovely Japanese woman write “Cathy C.’s Hall of Fame“? But that would have cost about ten bucks, and that seemed like a bit much for a bookmark. Whereas CATHY was just a quarter.

But I’d like to add my own message for you, whenever you use the bookmark. “When this you see, remember me.” I won’t mess up your bookmark, adding that message on the back. You’ll just have to think “When this you see, remember me” when the bookmark arrives.

Thinking of that quote and my name reminds me of Google Alerts. You can get an email, alerting you whenever your name pops up out there in web world. Sometimes it’s nice to check out where everybody knows your name (and they’ve been writing about you!). And sometimes it’s important to say, “Hey! You can’t just put up my essay or blog post on your blog without checking with me first!”

Well. You get the point. There are all sorts of good reasons to use Google Alerts. And bookmarks, too.

(Leave a comment to enter your name in the Birthday Giveaway. You could win a book, a lovely bookmark, and the birthday thingies that grow and grow and grow. Contest ends at midnight, October 31st. Which coincidentally marks the time I shall begin writing for NaNoWriMo.)